Confirmed: Ramadi soccer field car-bombing didn’t happen (yesterday)

posted at 9:11 am on February 28, 2007 by Allahpundit

A report of a bomb killing 18 people, mostly children, on Tuesday in the Iraqi city of Ramadi was wrong and stemmed from confusion over a similar attack the day before, police officials and residents said on Wednesday.

The reported killing of so many children drew swift condemnation from the president and the prime minister, but Colonel Tariq al Theibani, security adviser for Anbar province, said the report of the bombing on Tuesday was wrong.

“It happened the day before yesterday,” he told Reuters.

He said 18 people, many of them children, were killed on Monday by a suicide car bomb, as previously reported…

Theibani said the confusion may have arisen partly because the victims of Monday’s car bomb were buried on Tuesday.

The loud blast from Tuesday’s controlled explosion near a soccer field may have also contributed to the confusion.

“It’s a tragedy that the kids are targeted,” [Col. Tariq al-Alwani] said. “The kids we consider as a message to the world.” He said news of the bombing had emerged a day late because most reporters have left Ramadi out of concern for their safety.

It’s tempting to draw grand truths about the state of Iraq reporting from the fact that the AP, Reuters, AFP, and UPI all reported the bombing as having happened on Tuesday, but their sources were solid — local police and state TV — and blame was laid squarely at the feet of AQ, not the U.S. There’s no lesson here, I think, except maybe not to trust everything you see on al-Iraqiya.

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A report that 18 boys were killed this week in a car bombing in Ramadi is “false,” a senior U.S. military official said Wednesday.

Iraqi state television reported Tuesday that the attack occurred that day in the Sunni insurgent stronghold west of Baghdad. Iraqi police and military confirmed the account, but later said the bombing took place Monday. The offices of the president and prime minister had also denounced the reported attack.

The report brought denunciations from top Iraqi officials and international groups about violence targeting children.

But Rear Adm. Mark Fox, a U.S. military spokesman, said “the allegation was false” and suggested that rumors began circulating after a controlled detonation by U.S. forces caused injuries in Ramadi.

On Tuesday, a military statement said 30 civilians and one Iraqi soldier were injured by flying debris when troops destroyed 15 bags of explosives. None of the injuries was life-threatening, it added.

“There was no second blast,” Fox told reporters, “and there was no 18 children killed.”

The only journalists I want to hear from are those whose video/camera shots show when they are concerned for their saftety. Case-in-point: Pat Dollard. His camera angle is down looking up when he’s “concerned”. This is important because people like Pat don’t sacrifice the truth for their “safety” by leaving when it gets hot. Most of these idiots get out of town when it hits the fan while guys like Pat hit the deck and keep rolling.